1990 Pro Set Progressive Proofs

I'm digging into a somewhat forgotten folder in order to provide something a little different for today's post, that being a pair of 1990 Pro Set Proofs that were part of my COMC horde that I received after last years Spring sale.

As a kid I was a big fan of the Pro Set football cards, that and the 1989-92 Score products. So much so in fact, that after Pro Set went under, and Score started releasing cards that were no longer appealing to me design wise, I pretty much lost interest in modern football cards altogether. At the time when I saw these proofs, I was hit with a wave of nostalgia, enough so that I even ended up buying an $8 box of the 1990 series 1 edition not too long afterwards.

I have almost no information on these, other than going by the one example on the Trading Card Database site, each Pro Set card had four proofs showing the progression at four (go figure) different stages of the cards design. Other than that, I have nothing! I can surmise from what I've seen, that these are indeed true 1/1 (before 1/1 was a thing) blank back proofs that were made and used by Pro Set, but I, nor anyone else, seems to have any idea how they got out for public consumption.

First up we have Bob St. Clair, who if I'm not mistaken, might have been the only player from one of the four major sports to hold political office (Mayor of Daly City, CA) while still actively playing.

Here's a side by side comparison with the finished product:

I really enjoy seeing them next to their completed counterpart, especially this one.

And then there's Bob Griese, winner of two Super Bowls, the 1971 MVP... and of course, captain of the '72 Dolphins team, still the only team to have completed a perfect season (Super Bowl included):

 

Another side by side:

As you can see, this one is a little closer to the finished product than the St. Clair.

From what I've seen, these proofs could be considered somewhat rare, although this is one of those instances where rare doesn't necessarily equate to valuable... due to the fact that there aren't too many collectors for this type of thing out there. Price wise, I can't remember exactly how much I paid, but I think it was somewhere in the $5-$6 apiece range, which was probably a little more than I would have paid had I not been using earned credit. So because of that, I only went with the two hall of famers that were available at the time. At some point I would love to find the other three proof cards that would make for a set on each of these, as well as try to get a few more reasonably priced hall of famers.


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